The Beginner's Guide to Doing Everything In iTunes
- The iTunes Interface
- Play CDs
- Import CDs
- Create Your Own Playlists
- Burn an Audio CD
- Play the Radio
- The iTunes Store
- Manage and Play Videos in iTunes
- The Source List
- The Detail Window
- View the iTunes Libraries
- Search the iTunes Libraries
- View Options
- Close, Minimize, and Zoom Buttons
- Controller Buttons
- Video Controller Buttons
- Party Shuffle
- Quick Links
- Share Music Over a Local Network
- Print CD Jewel Case Inserts, Song Listings, or Album Listings
- Song Information and Options
- Status Display
- Rate Your Songs
- Export Playlists as Plain Text, Unicode, or XML Files
- iTunes Preferences
- Music File Formats
- iTunes Visualizer
- iTunes Equalizer
- Connect an iPhone, iPod, or Apple TV
- Back up the iTunes Libraries
- Menu Commands
- Favorite Keyboard Shortcuts
iTunes is your one-stop digital media hub. With iTunes you can import music, organize it, play it, and share it with others. You can also use iTunes to watch movies, music videos, and TV shows. If you own an Apple device such as an iPhone, iPod, or Apple TV, you can use iTunes to download critical software updates to your device and sync it with your Mac.
Create your own playlists that contain the songs and videos you want, in the order you want. Then burn a CD of your favorite collections to take with you. Create Smart Playlists that automatically organize songs and videos into collections based on conditions that you set. If you want to play songs randomly, use iTunes’ “Party Shuffle” feature to shuffle songs around in a playlist.
The online iTunes Store provides a place to preview and purchase music, music videos, movies, and TV shows. Thirty-second previews of more than a million songs are available, including thousands of exclusive prerelease tracks and many rare, out-of-date albums. You can also search for and download podcasts—free audio and video shows produced by amateurs and professionals alike.
iTunes is closely integrated with the other iLife applications—iPhoto, iMovie, iDVD, iWeb, and GarageBand—making it easy to add music to slideshows, movies, DVDs, websites, podcasts, and to your own music arrangements.
The iTunes Interface
A quick overview of the iTunes interface is shown here and on the next page. Most of the controls you need are located directly on the iTunes interface. Almost every control is explained in detail elsewhere in this chapter.
In the example below, the Music library is selected in the Source list (the section on the left side of the window), and the Music library’s contents are shown in the Detail window (the large pane to the right of the Source list). When you select an item in the Source list, its contents appear in the Detail window on the right.
In the example below, a playlist is selected in the Source list. For each item in the Source list, you can customize the Detail window view to show the columns of information you want. See “View Options” on page 229.